Training: and if we dared to look reality in the face

Knowledge transfer does not exist

However, in the mid-1960s, Jean Piaget formulated the following hypothesis: a learner cannot absorb the knowledge of his teachers; knowledge is an individual construction that each person makes in his own way, thanks to his own neural networks and by exploiting his previous knowledge.  Knowledge is as personal as a... mole on your nose! No one could help you create a mole because no one has any control over your epidermis, nor over your neurons and the encodings of knowledge that you make.

The one who knows vs. the one who learns

This hypothesis formulated by Piaget has been confirmed by recent experiments conducted in neuroscience[1] ; we now know that in order to learn, neurons must be connected and energy must be invested. No energy invested, no lasting learning! As simple as that.

When an expert, no matter how good he is, gives a course, it is because he has carried out the following activities: he has defined a content, he has organized this content from the point of view of the one who knows (and not from the point of view of the one who has to learn), he has prepared slides, which necessarily places him in a transmissive mode, and he has perhaps thought of adding exercises that he will propose after his explanations.

In this sequence, everything diverges from Piaget's thought who would rather say:

• Put the initiative back in the hands of participants by preparing learning environments that encourage discovery,
• Give them challenges to overcome,
• Have them work in teams to bring out the knowledge through collective intelligence,
• Go back and forth as a group to compare the teams' findings, provoking controversy if necessary,
• Trust the learners and the knowledge will emerge,
• Change the role of the expert to that of a guide rather than a dispenser of knowledge.

Of course, they may make mistakes, but mistakes are a source of learning and the expert is there to recover and stabilize the knowledge. Finally, one rule is reliable: we teach as little as possible and as late as possible in the learning sequence!

To learn the brain must make an effort

In such a context, learners will have invested energy, they will have worked on building their own knowledge and their interest will be increased tenfold. But to make such a paradigm shift, you need to ask for help from specialists in instructional design or pedagogy. Experts can hardly do it by themselves. Pedagogy is not an infused science that one masters simply by having been schooled!

In conclusion

And if we dared to look the truth in the face, we would admit that transmissive training is like a sword in the water! And we would dare to go further by creating learning scenarios that force the participant to take the wheel!

To go further : 

[1] Consult Steve Masson's writings, in particular his latest book: Activating your neurons: for better learning and teaching.